Prosecutors Avoid Autopsy Photos of Children in Nanny Trial

At 2 years old, Leo Krim was too young to defend himself when his nanny dragged a knife across his neck, slicing a jugular vein and striking his spinal cord. His wounds suggested that he could have been cut from behind.

But the injuries his sister, Lucia Krim, 6, sustained suggested she fought back. She was stabbed 22 times in the neck and six times in the torso. There were also cuts on her hands and arms, a medical examiner testified on Monday in State Supreme Court in Manhattan in the trial of the nanny, Yoselyn Ortega.

The siblings’ mother, Marina Krim, found the children dead and bloodied five and a half years ago in the family’s Upper West Side apartment, the nanny stabbing herself in the neck in a suicide attempt.

Charged with first-degree murder, Ms. Ortega has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. But while the case is likely to turn on evidence about the defendant’s mental health, the early days of the prosecution’s case have laid out some of the killings’ most wrenching and graphic aspects.

Last week, at least two jurors wiped away tears as the panel reviewed crime scene photos, including images of the slain children. One juror was replaced with an alternate last Tuesday after he said he could no longer be fair and impartial in the case.

This week, though, prosecutors spared the jury from reviewing autopsy photos in what may be a strategic move to avoid having the gruesome details of the case bolster the defense contention that at the time of the killings, Ms. Ortega did not understand that what she was doing was wrong.

Outside experts gave several possible reasons for the prosecution approach.

“If you’re not a psychopath, why kill them?” said Stephen Pokart, a Legal Aid lawyer, who represented a defendant who was found not guilty by reason of insanity in a murder trial. “Crazy people do that. Human beings don’t do that unless there is a reason like being seriously mentally ill. Maybe prosecutors think it will show that this woman must be insane.”

Evan Krutoy, a former Manhattan prosecutor who now does some criminal defense work but focuses on Title IX investigations and internal sexual harassment investigations for organizations and companies, said graphic autopsy photos did not necessarily add much to a case. He said showing autopsy photos in this case could come across to the jury as heavy-handed.

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Yoselyn Ortega has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity in the stabbing deaths of two children in her care. Prosecutors decided not to show the jury the autopsy photos.CreditPool photo by Jefferson Siegel

“There’s no doubt she did it,” he said. “More often than not district attorneys tend not to use autopsy photos unless to advance the case in a meaningful way.”

Mr. Krutoy said prosecutors had to strike the right balance and practice some level of restraint, particularly in a case that is emotionally charged.

“You don’t want to turn off jurors,” he said. “No one wants to lose jurors in a case, particularly if they were picked for a reason.”

New York City’s chief medical examiner, Susan F. Ely, described the findings in the children’s autopsies, which provided insight into their final moments. Prosecutors displayed diagrams with an outline of an adult body. A diagram by the medical examiner who conducted the autopsy used lines and circles to show the location and severity of their injuries. On a diagram for Lucia Krim, there was a circle in the middle of the chest and other marks throughout.

“There were many gaping wounds,” Dr. Ely said. She said that her injuries indicated “quite a lot of struggle and movement to get away from this knife” and that some of the wounds had twisting patterns and were angular.

Leo Krim was stabbed four times in the neck and bled to death in a matter of minutes, Dr. Ely said. A diagram for Leo Krim included markings around his neck to indicate the areas where he was mortally wounded.

Jurors stared at the diagrams and listened intently as Ms. Ely discussed the injuries. One juror grimaced at the details. Another held her eyes closed for minutes at a time.

The autopsies could not determine which child was stabbed first.

During cross-examination, Ms. Ortega’s lawyer, Valerie Van Leer-Greenberg, tried to suggest that the multiple injuries Lucia Krim sustained reflected the actions of “a person who had imploded” and lost control.

Dr. Ely said that it was not her role to determine Ms. Ortega’s mental state. “I’m not in the minds of people,” she said. “I can tell you the story of a body. Bodies don’t lie.”

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A20 of the New York edition with the headline: In Nanny Trial, Photos Of Autopsies Go Unseen. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe